PREFACE 
ALTHOUGH important collections of plants had been made in 
western Szech’uan by the French missionary Armand David as 
early as 1870, the world knew little of the remarkable beauty 
and richness of the flora of west central China until Augustine 
Henry, an officer of the Chinese Imperial Maritime Customs 
Service stationed at Ichang from 1882 to 1889, sent to England 
the dried plants which he had collected in western Hupeh. An 
examination of these collections, the first of which reached 
England in 1886, disclosed many new genera and a great num- 
ber of new species. Henry collected only herbarium specimens 
and a few lily bulbs, and took no steps to introduce into western 
gardens his remarkable discoveries. 
It was evident, however, that from no other part of the world 
could so many new plants suitable to adorn the parks and 
gardens of temperate climates be found as in western China; 
and in 1897 I advised the late James H. Veitch, at that time 
the Managing Director of the well-known nursery firm of James 
H. Veitch & Sons, of London, to send a collector to Hupeh to 
collect the seeds of Henry’s interesting discoveries, and to make 
additional observations on the flora of that region. : 
Mr. E. H. Wilson, a student at the Royal College of Science, 
South Kensington, and previously a young gardener in the 
Royal Gardens at Kew, then twenty-three years old, was selected 
on the recommendation of Sir William T. Thiselton-Dyer for 
the undertaking. He left England on April 11, 1899, traveling 
by the way of Boston in order to visit the Arboretum, and then, 
after a short stay in Yunnan, where he went to confer with Dr. 
Henry, who was then stationed at Szemao, he reached Ichang 
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